Premier Foods to make £20m site investment

PREMIER Foods, the owner of the famous Mr Kipling business, has announced plans to invest £20m in building a new production and packing line at its cake manufacturing site in Yorkshire.

The new line at its Barnsley site will be capable of producing 300m cake slices a year, doubling the company’s current capacity to meet growing consumer demand for its Snack Pack format of individually wrapped slices.

Mr. Kipling Snack Packs were introduced in 2011 to provide a convenient, on-the-go snack suitable for lunchboxes and in-home eating occasions that have since proved a runaway success.

The investment will take 12 months to complete and involve the installation of a mixing station, oven and sophisticated packing robotics adding significant volume to the site.

Jason Ramsay, factory general manager for the Carlton site, said: “This investment is a strong vote of confidence by Premier Foods in the Carlton site and the Carlton workforce. We have been manufacturing Mr. Kipling cake at Carlton since 1975 and this latest news is a huge boost for all of us.”